Simon Gipps-Kent (born Simon Trevor Kent; 25 October 1958 – 16 September 1987)[3] was an English theatre and filmactor in the 1970s and 1980s, known for his teenage portrayals of British royalty and nobility.[2][4] He was born into a show business family in Kensington, London. His television debut was on the BBC in 1971 followed with a London West End theatre debut in 1972. He continued to act on stage, film and television until the year before his death in 1987.
Early life and education
Simon Trevor Kent was born in London to Peter Gipps Kent, a variety artist, and Sonia (née Aebersold) Kent, a dancer. At age 12 he decided acting would be his career. As a youth he attended the Ladbroke Grove School in West London where he wrote, produced, directed and acted in his own play as a way of gaining recognition.[2] Brought up as a Catholic, he attended the London Oratory School in Brompton from September 1970 to June 1974, moving to Cardinal Manning Roman Catholic Boys' School, also in London.[2]
Theatre
Simon Gipps-Kent, as he would later call himself, had early experience on the British stage that, according to his talent agency listings, included alternately playing one of the royal children (either Prince Bertie or Prince Alfie) in I and Albert at the Piccadilly Theatre in 1972–73, and as Max-Ernst von Kellig in A Lesson in Blood and Roses, starring with Ben Kingsley at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1973. He appeared in the production Fantastic Fairground at the Young Vic in 1974, and a Young Vic tour of Macbeth, playing Fleance, in Mexico and Spain in 1975. Gipps-Kent played "Emmanuel" to Herbert Lom's Napoleon Bonaparte in William Douglas-Home's Betzi at the Haymarket Theatre and on a provincial tour in 1975. In 1976–77 he appeared in Where the Rainbow Ends at the Gardner Theatre, Brighton.[2]
In a 1979 newspaper interview titled Simon's Problem is Time, Gipps-Kent expressed his wish to move on to adult roles, including more Shakespeare, but in spite of his accumulated credentials to date, he had been denied those opportunities. Due to his "boyish good looks and modest figure", he found himself playing younger characters than his real age, mostly on British television, for the majority of his career.
Gipps-Kent later returned to London theatre work in the 1981 run of Romulus Linney's Childe Byron at the Young Vic with David Essex as Lord Byron.[2][5] For five months in 1983 he appeared in the London Shakespeare Group's productions of Betrayal and Twelfth Night, which also played a short season at the Donmar Warehouse and toured extensively for the British Council in China, Japan and throughout the Far East, Middle East and Africa.[2]
In 1974, in a film for the then Children's Film Foundation, he starred in The Firefighters as a "junior firefighter" accused of arson who must, with the aid of his younger brother and sister, prove his innocence and find the real arsonists before his court appearance.[11] That production and the entire CFF archive are now curated by the BFI. Also in 1975, he appeared in Edward the Seventh, again portraying young Prince Edward ("Bertie"), this time for ITV. For a time he also played Kenton Archer in the BBC radio serial The Archers.[9]
Gipps-Kent was "Rudkin the Messenger" in the pilot episode for the Rowan Atkinson comedy series The Black Adder in 1982. That same year Gipps-Kent guest-starred in a series 4 episode of the popular British children's programme Metal Mickey. He was a series regular on Eureka in the 80s, playing numerous historic and fictional characters, such as J.P. Knight, with other series regulars like Sylvester McCoy.[12]
Death
Simon Gipps-Kent died in his flat on Cavendish Road in the London Borough of Brent on 16 September 1987, aged 28.[1] His funeral was held on 28 September at the Golders Green Crematorium. His body was cremated there and his ashes were later scattered on the Crocus Lawn, Section 3H.
